France leads reigning two-time champ Spain 2-0

Tennis Betting Lines

07/09/2010 - Clermont-Ferrand, France (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - A quality French team, led by Gael Monfils, has a 2-0 lead against reigning two-time champion Spain in their best-of-five Davis Cup quarterfinal in France.

The world No. 17 Monfils outlasted gritty 12th-ranked Spaniard David Ferrer in five sets, 7-6 (7-3), 6-2, 4-6, 5-7, 6-4, in Friday's opening singles rubber. The flashy Frenchman swatted 21 aces and prevailed in just under four hours in a marathon rubber on the indoor hardcourt at Zenith Grande Halle d'Auvergne in Clermont-Ferrand.

World No. 35 Michael Llodra then gave the hosts a commanding 2-0 advantage by overcoming 10th-ranked fellow lefthander Fernando Verdasco 6-7 (5-7), 6-4, 6-3, 7-6 (7-2). Llodra pulled off the upset in 3 hours, 25 minutes, as the Frenchman tallied four service breaks, while Verdasco settled for only one.

Saturday's doubles currently call for a French tandem of Llodra and Julien Benneteau to battle a Spanish duo of Verdasco and Feliciano Lopez, while Sunday's reverse singles currently pit Monfils against Verdasco and Llodra versus Ferrer.

France is captained by Guy Forget, while Spain is led by former French Open champ Albert Costa, who guided the Spaniards to another title last season.

The French team also has Gilles Simon at its disposal, while Spain has Nicolas Almagro on its bench. World No. 1 superstar and reigning Wimbledon and French Open champion Rafael Nadal decided against playing for Spain this week.

Spain is 5-1 all-time versus France, who won the first meeting between the two nations way back in 1923. The Spaniards have won four of the last 10 Davis Cup championships, including a victory over the Czech Republic in last year's finale.

The France-Spain winner will meet the Argentina-Russia victor in the semifinals in September.

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What Is the Point Spread?

What are Sports Betting Point Spreads?

In any football or basketball game (the main sports that use point spreads) there are two teams playing against each other.

Those teams, though, are rarely exactly evenly matched – meaning that typically one team has a better chance than the other to win the game. If bettors were allowed to bet on who was simply going to win the game, smart ones would obviously bet on the better team (likely winning more than 50% of the time in the process).

If winning were that easy the Las Vegas and online sportsbooks would stop taking any bets! This is where the point spread comes in: the basic function of the point spread is to balance the likelihood of each team “winning” by adjusting the final score by the point spread. After this adjustment is made you get the Against The Spread result (ATS result for short).

Let’s look at Super Bowl XXXIX, New England Patriots vs. Philadelphia Eagles. Most people believed the defending champ Patriots to be the better team – so if betting were simply based upon which team would win the game, an uneven majority of people would have wagered on New England. But, by using the point spread, the bookmakers adjusted the terms of the bet, evening the proposition so about half the people believed the Pats to be the smart bet, while the other half considered Philly to be the smart bet.

How to Read Point Spreads

New England Patriots -7 vs. Philadelphia Eagles

The better team, called the Favorite, is expected to win the game and must “give” or “lay” points to the weaker team. The favorite is listed with a minus sign and the number of points they are favored by (e.g., New England -7)

In the case of our example, New England must not only win the game, but they must win by more than 7 points for Pats bettors to have a winning ATS result. An Eagles bettor wins his bet either if:

To visit this internet sportsbook go to MySportsbook.com for all your football betting and World Series odds.